Broadway Show Ticket Sales Analysis w/e 3/15/2015

In the week ending March 15, 2015, five new shows began previews: The King and I, An American in Paris, Skylight, Finding Neverland, and Hand to God.

This week’s notable movements on Broadway are:

“The King and I,” “An American in Paris,” and “Skylight”

In the week ending March 15, 2015, five new shows kicked off the spring season by beginning previews. None of them were sell outs right out of the gate, but they are all appearing to be strong contenders for the season. First of all, the Lincoln Center production of The King and I began previews on March 12, 2015. In its first week of four performances, the show brought in $420,879, which represents 75.58% of the gross potential. With an average ticket price of $100.50, the theatre was at 100% capacity, showing a degree of discounting and a successful effort to fill all seats for the first performances. In addition, An American in Paris began previews with a first partial week of two performances. Over those two shows, the new Gershwin musical brought in $317,918, which represents 86.55% of its gross potential. With an average paid admission of $100.57, the theatre was at an average 98.7% capacity, showing successful use of strategic discounting. Furthermore, David Hare’s Skylight began performances this past week, playing three shows in its first partial week. In that time, the show brought in $253,369, which represents 83.59% of the show’s gross potential. Similarly, with an average paid admission of $105.31, the audience was at 100% capacity. Therefore, all three of these shows performed similarly in its first few performances, modestly discounting and successfully filling almost all seats.

“Finding Neverland” and “Hand to God”

In addition, the week ending March 15, 2015 saw two additional new shows begin previews, which are at opposing ends of the spectrum in terms of familiarity of brand name and industry power. Finding Neverland, based on the film of the same name, is produced by Harvey Weinstein, a Hollywood powerhouse producer and distributor who is venturing into Broadway producing for the first time with this new musical. With the brand power of the familiar film behind it, Weinstein is betting this show will attract an eager audience. This past week, it only had one preview so far, making it difficult to analyze how successfully the show is performing out of the gate. Still, in that one performance it brought in $159,823, which represents 85.9% of the gross potential. With an average ticket price of $105.84, the show filled 102.1% of its seats in that one performance. Finally, “Hand to God” also began performances this past week, playing also one performance. Unlike the Weinstein production, this show comes to Broadway after a successful Off-Broadway (arguably Off-Off-Broadway) run at the Ensemble Studio Theatre, where the playwright, director, and several actors all making their Broadway debuts. It may take some time for this show’s word of mouth to spread, as in the first preview it brought in only $36,122, which represents 46.02% of the show’s potential. Nevertheless, it still managed to fill 98.2% of seats due to a heavy amount of discounting.
The following are the Broadway ticket sales numbers for the week ending March 15, 2015: